


cold nights (i wish i didn't spend with you)

by cozune



Category: OTWYA, The ones they warned you about
Genre: 1940s, Cold Weather, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, M/M, cursing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-19
Updated: 2018-09-19
Packaged: 2019-07-14 04:49:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,658
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16033322
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cozune/pseuds/cozune
Summary: Ludwig finds his prominent loneliness irritating. It becomes completely unfair once the last person he wants to see, being the cause of that loneliness, arrives at his doorstep in the middle of the night.





	cold nights (i wish i didn't spend with you)

**Author's Note:**

> These characters nourish my crops.
> 
> Original characters belong to Paachu (@tumblr: the-otwya-project or paachubelle)

It is terribly cold.

 

Ludwig can feel the freezing temperatures faintly with his hands pressed on the windows. The silence in such a large house makes him uncomfortable. It is too dangerous to invite anyone over, that is if they’re still alive, at a time like this. In the end, he resorts to starting up the fireplace. The crackling barely helps. Still, he stokes the fire and watches the flames grow bigger. It is better than being left alone with his thoughts.

 

The streets, snowy as they are, should have welcomed many families but they are hauntingly empty. The white gleams brighter under the filtered light from the clouds and the street lamps. The red in the snow is only more prominent. Ludwig shivers- pretending that it’s from the cold- at the sight. He pretends he’s watching the sunset instead but even the clouds look bloodstained from the sky, mirroring the ground. God, he needs a drink.

 

He sits, staring outside, and it feels like it’s been forever until the clock chimes twelve. It’s much too late for him to be up, but he can’t bring himself to sleep. Ludwig seems to find difficulty sleeping nowadays.

 

It’s also far too late for visitors yet there are heavy knocks- pounding- on his door. Ludwig glances outside, a blizzard seems to be setting foot. Ludwig stands, his heart dropping for no reason. Suddenly, the fire crackling is a much less comforting idea than it originally seemed. Ludwig hesitantly opens the door just a bit, one hand just in reach of the revolver on the table just next to the door. Anyone out in this weather would either be desperate or insane and the man standing before him, visibly trying to stop himself from shaking and covered in snow with such a tired expression, is frankly both.

 

“Ludwig, I need your help.” Ludwig almost slammed the door shut before he finished his sentence but a foot got caught between the door and frame. “I swear to you on my life, I can explain. Let me in.”

 

Pressing his body against the door, Ludwig sighed, trying to contain himself. “I’m afraid I can’t do that. At this point, I don’t think our relationship is in any sort of trustworthy state.”

 

The man huffed in frustration, which Ludwig took quite an offense to. If anything, _Ludwig_ should be angry, watching that train leave was no easy feat. “Ludwig,” He said his name roughly as if he was giving orders before pausing and muttering, “I have no reason to lie."

 

“You have lied plenty of times. You don’t particularly need a reason to lie now, I would think.” Ludwig scowls. It feels strange to have his face contort with such frustration. He never usually overtly expresses his distaste in such a way but, of course, this _is_ the same man who had filled his heart with so many promises- empty promises. “I believe that you have done enough.”

 

As he began to close the door again, the man says “I have no reason to lie to _you_.”

 

Ludwig wavers before retorting, “Goodbye.” Despite wanting company, Ludwig desperately wants to keep him out. He’d much rather forget they ever met. He started to put more force in closing the door, kicking the man’s foot out of the way. The resistance against the door started to shift and Ludwig found it difficult to push back until he grabbed his revolver.

 

The door is suddenly pushed open as Ludwig falls to the ground, gun trained on the, now, intruder. Despite the situation, he doesn’t look terribly surprised and must be used to being at gunpoint.

 

“I will shoot you, Mr. Jaeger.” Ludwig makes his voice steely as possible to avoid having the waver in his voice audible.

 

“I don’t doubt that, Ludwig.” Then there’s an expression that Ludwig has never seen before. It looks desperate and almost mournful. Even while pointing a gun at him, Ludwig stares at the hand reached to him as the door is shut behind them, “All I want is to talk to you. I promise you that-.”

 

“God, _enough_.” Ludwig swats his hand away and stands on his own without so much as a twitch to move the gun away from its target. He feels angry- maybe betrayed or frustrated is a better word. “I know very well what a promise is to you and I damn well know I'm no fool to believe it another time-.”

 

“Ludwig, listen-.”

 

His voice suddenly grows even louder. Ludwig is just as taken aback as he is, “You abandoned me!” Ludwig hates how heartachingly desperate he sounds, how lonely he sounds. “You promised me you wouldn't leave but still you abandoned me. Your paperwork was more important than your life when you went to the fucking warfront?” Ludwig hopes he isn't crying. His ears feels like they were buzzing, making everything seem like a blur. He knows he’s being unreasonable. Those documents may be the key to ending the war in the first place. He knows that much.

 

“ I didn't leave to spite you-.”

 

“I watched the train leave! I watched you go with the soldiers and look out the damn window to pretend I didn't exist, calling for you-.” Ludwig hates how loud he is. For once, a voice fills his house but he prefers it to not be his own. Ludwig feels himself running out of breath and staggers back, the gun lowering to his side, just as his voice breaks. He leans back tiredly against the table and puts a hand to his face, inadvertently trying to hide whatever godforsaken expression he was making, dropping the revolver on the table.

 

Ludwig doesn't hate many things, he finds it hard to purely hate something or someone. Perhaps it was the cloud of irritation of seeing him again or the sudden shock of the situation, but Ludwig hates how quiet he is. _Be angry at me_ , he wants to yell again _Scream or lecture or even shake your head just show some sign of caring._ All he needs is a reaction. But Ludwig doesn’t dare to speak again. He is tired. Unbelievably tired. He still doesn’t say anything. They’re either too afraid to speak or too afraid to hear what the other has to say.

 

“I’m sorry.” Ludwig starts again, his voice is too quiet. He doesn’t exactly want to be heard. “I know I’m being unreasonable. But I hope you know that I hate being lied to especially by those closest to me.”

 

“Hate me if you want, but I had no choice.” Ludwig doesn’t even glance up, staring at his shoes. His right shoe has a scratch on it and the left shoe has a frayed shoelace which is terribly uncouth. He sees black shoes enter his field of vision, wet from the snow and a bit muddy, tracking dirt inside the house. How rude. “I didn’t want to leave. I didn’t want to leave _you_. I would have stayed if I could.”

 

Ludwig stiffens as his hands are grasped by freezing gloved hands. He looks up hesitantly, the distance had closed between them rapidly. Their chests were nearly touching and Ludwig almost felt the need to lean further back onto the table. Ludwig can clearly see the drops of melted snow in light brown hair and how damp his trenchcoat is.

 

“I couldn’t have known that.” Ludwig immediately looks away and closed his eyes to reassess his next words. He tries to tug his hands away but it the grasp only tightens with what Ludwig would have liked to call ‘wanting’. Ludwig tries to tug his hands away again but they’re only pressed closer due to their equivalent stubbornness, “You know I couldn’t have known that. You’re always disappearing and reappearing, hiding and deceiving, how could I have possibly known that you would have stayed, that you would have even come back? God, there’s only so much I can hold onto before I start to think that you’ve died-.”

 

Ludwig hasn’t rambled in so long, a sense of panic setting in just at the thought of it, but his breath is taken away all the same.

 

Despite all of the innocent signs and, admittedly, not-so-innocent signs, they’ve never gone as far as brushing their hands while passing papers or books to each other. It seems that they’ve gone out of order to suddenly kiss but common courtesy is far beyond Ludwig’s mind at the moment. His lips taste bitter like cigarettes and Ludwig is sure that the taste of his own pipe lingered in his mouth as well. Ludwig’s hands find the nape of his neck, damp from dragging them up his trenchcoat, and pulls him closer as Ludwig’s waist is pressed against his. Closer and closer yet not close enough, it is getting hard to breath until they both break away, panting.

 

“I’m here.”

 

Ludwig can’t say that he remembers much of the rest of the night other than its sleeplessness and how the fire made the bedroom even warmer with the curtains drawn to avoid suspicion. Ludwig still feels the ghost of the feeling of his nails raking down his back or his lips trailing down Ludwig’s bare neck and biting down as a testament to their pain. “Stay.” Ludwig would tell him selfishly. There would be no answer just more bitter kisses.

 

In the morning Ludwig is hopeful to think that he’ll see his sleeping face with their legs entangled with one another, arms around each other. Of course, this is too hopeful. Rumpled sheets and a cold pillow marked where he might have been if hadn’t been for the circumstances.

 

Ludwig lay back down, rubbing his hands over his face, and sighed not so much angry but more nostalgic. Most of his anger was lashed out last night. His name feels like a memory, though Ludwig isn’t sure whether it’s good or bad, despite their intimacy.

 

“Heinrich.”


End file.
